Stephen Storace (4 April 1762 – 19 March 1796) Was an English Composer
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Stephen Storace (4 April 1762 – 19 March 1796) was an English composer. His sister was the famous opera singer Nancy Storace. He was born in London in the Parish of St Marylebone to an English mother and Italian father. Relatively little is known through direct records of his life, and most details are known second-hand through the memoirs of his contemporaries Michael Kelly, the actor John Bannister, and the oboist William Thomas Parke. Stephen Storace (1762 – 1796) Nancy Storace (1765–1817) His father, Stefano Storace, an Italian contrabassist, taught him the violin so well that at ten years old he played successfully the most difficult music of the day. The composer's youth was spent entirely in the company of musicians, since his father (also a composer and arranger) was the Musical Director of Vauxhall Gardens. Mistrusting the quality of musical education available in England, Stefano Storace sent his son to Italy to study, at the Conservatorio di Sant' Onofrio, Naples. Stephen neglected his musical studies in Italy, and went on painting expeditions with Thomas Jones. His interest in art may not have been entirely extinguished, however - unlike the works of any of his English contemporaries, the printed vocal scores of all his operas feature elaborate engravings of what are presumed to be the stage-designs, and it is suggested that these drawings were Stephen's own work. No other artist, at least, seems to have claimed credit for them. Towards the end of their studies, Stephen and Nancy first made the acquaintance of Michael Kelly, whom they encountered by chance in Livorno. Kelly was with English-speaking friends, and ventured an opinion (in English) as to whether the young person with Stephen was a boy or a girl. "The person is a she-animal" retorted an offended Nancy in English as the first remark in what would be a lifelong friendship with both the Storaces. Stephen Storace returned to England sometime between the years of 1780 and 1782, most likely to settle his father, Stefano's, affairs after his death in Naples, which probably happened around 1780-1781. Nancy, accompanied by her mother, Elizabeth, went to Vienna in January 1783. Nancy entered into an arranged marriage, (most likely arranged by her mother), to the English violinist and composer, John Fisher, in March 1784. The marriage only lasted a few months. It is unclear how Stephen obtained his first commission to compose an Italian opera for the Viennese stage, but the commission was most likely obtained by Nancy sometime in the fall of 1784, with Stephen arriving in Vienna sometime in late December of that same year. Stephen produced his first opera, Gli Sposi malcontenti, at Vienna, on 1 June 1785. The premiere, however, was marred by further scandal involving his sister, who was singing the prima buffa role - she collapsed on-stage in mid-aria, causing the performance to be abandoned. Nancy was pregnant during the premiere of "I sposi malcontenti" and gave birth to a baby girl a few weeks later. The child was given to a foundling home by Elizabeth Storace, who claimed that it belonged to Nancy's estranged husband, John Fisher, who had been banished by the Emperor some months earlier for beating Nancy. Elizabeth Storace claimed that they didn't care if the child lived or died. The child died in the foundling home a month after she was born. Nancy's return to the stage four months later, was marked by the performance of a Cantata per la ricuperata di Ophelia, composed specially for the occasion by a trio of composers - Mozart, Salieri, and the unknown "Cornetti" (which may have been a pen-name for Stephen). Sadly this rare example of a Mozart-Salieri collaboration has been entirely lost. In Vienna the Storaces made the acquaintance of Mozart, in whose Le nozze di Figaro Nancy sang Susanna at the premiere, and Kelly sang Don Curzio. The "English circle" in Vienna also included the composer Thomas Attwood. In Vienna Stephen produced a second opera, Gli equivoci, founded on Shakespeare's The Comedy of Errors. There is no clear explanation why the Storaces abandoned Vienna at the height of their success there. The reasons are suggested to be more personal than professional. Certainly the Emperor spoke of her with great admiration, even using her abilities as an arbitrary unit of currency - "I'd not give you a Storace for it!” Quite possibly Nancy was under pressure from Elizabeth, who was not at all happy in Vienna, and wished to return to England with both of her children in tow. Nancy left Vienna in February 1787, along with her "entourage" of Michael Kelly, her brother, and Thomas Attwood. Buoyed-up by their success on the Viennese stage, the coach-party which left for London could not have imagined they would find themselves rejected and unwanted in London, where their names were quite forgotten after such a long absence. Stephen was remembered - if at all - as an infant prodigy violinist at Vauxhall Gardens, and found it very hard to secure paying work without the cherubic charm of youth behind him, and moreover as an unknown composer. Both Nancy and Stephen imagined they might find work at the King's Theatre, which was - at that time - the home of the Royal Italian Opera, a troupe which enjoyed a Royal monopoly on the presentation of Italian opera, and in fact of any musical works which were through-composed without dialogue. Kelly succeeded in getting a few roles there (on the basis of his wider professional experience, knowing roles the King's Theatre already had in repertoire, and his legendary charm), but both Storaces found themselves excluded by the group of native Italian musicians already well-established there. Stephen too worked at the King's Theatre as music director for some operas, including his own "La Cameriera Astuta," before moving in 1789 to the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, which at this time was under the management of Richard Brinsley Sheridan. Sheridan's personal interest in the theatre had largely dried-up by this point in his career, and he was more interested in politics - his theatrical interests were primarily financial, and he had established a successful format of lavish musical spectaculars, more remarkable for their visual than musical content. To evade the Royal monopoly on opera at the King's Theatre, Sheridan presented a mixture of [Singspiel]-type works specially written in English in the ballad-opera style, with "English'd" versions of popular operas playing in continental Europe in which he saw some commercial opportunity. Stephen Storace's first job of work at Drury Lane was to make an "English" version of Dittersdorf's German Singspiel Doktor und Apotheker, which appeared in English as Doctor & Apothecary in 1787 in Storace's version. The work of making "English" versions was not just a question of translation - all complicated musical numbers (especially trios, quartets etc.) had to be "cut" to make them performable by English casts who were primarily pantomime comedians without any great musical talent. This also meant transposition of some numbers, making a fresh English text, cutting whole numbers and replacing them with dialogue, and sometimes inserting new comic songs and "patter-songs" which the public greatly enjoyed. Stephen quickly established his credentials with Sheridan as a young man who could quickly and competently produce good results. He also had an impresario's skill for judging what would make good box-office and bring in good receipts, and he took to adding famous numbers from the Vienna stage to "spice-up" works which needed it. Seeing that the repertoire of the King's Theatre was still largely made-up of [opera seria] works about ancient gods or monarchs of antiquity, Storace spotted a niche in the market for the new "romantic" style of ghost-stories, gothic horror, and romance, and his first purpose-written work for Drury Lane employed all these elements. The Haunted Tower (1789) was a box-office sensation, selling-out for 50 nights in succession. No little part of the success was the performance of Michael Kelly in the male lead role. Up to this time, high notes in the male parts in the theatre had been crooned falsetto by performers who were more actors than singers. Kelly's aria to the ghost of the Haunted Tower - "Spirit Of My Sainted Sire!" included a top Bb which he took in full voice in the Italian style, and proved such a success that at most performances it was encored in full. This aria outlived the rest of Storace's output by decades, and was still being reprinted in parlour songbook anthologies for the amateur tenor a century later. However, "The Haunted Tower" still included "borrowings" from other composers on whose reputations tickets might be sold, and Sheridan remained adamant - despite the success of the piece - that he did not want Storace composing fresh work as a regular occurrence. Storace was put to work producing an "English" version of Gretry's Richard, Coeur du Lion, with the unfortunate difficulty that John Bannister - the famous tragedian - was cast in the main role, and was tone-deaf. No amount of re-writing could get around the problem that Richard was supposed to sing his famous ballad so that Blondin would hear it outside the castle walls. As so often in Storace's life, he was saved by his friends. Michael Kelly was now established as the audience's favourite star after Bannister, and was given a Benefit Night in 1790 - by tradition, he could choose whatever piece he believed would bring in the best receipts at the box-office.